Male dominance in society always means that out of public sight, in the private, ahistorical world of men with women, men are sexually dominating women.
Andrea DworkinRead
The will to domination is a ravenous beast. There are never enough warm bodies to satiate its monstrous hunger. Once alive, this beast grows and grows, feeding on all the life around it, scouring the earth to find new sources of nourishment. This beast lives in each man who battens on female servitude.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote highlights the destructive and insatiable nature of power and domination, particularly in the context of gender relations.
Andrea Dworkin's quote illustrates the concept of domination as an insatiable force that perpetuates itself through exploitation, particularly of women. The metaphor of the 'ravenous beast' signifies how the desire for control and subjugation grows relentlessly, consuming all that lives around it, suggesting that such power structures are deep-rooted and destructive to both the oppressor and the oppressed.
Themes
DominationPowerServitudeOppressionGenderExploitation
In practice
Example use cases
During a discussion on gender equality, this quote can be used to emphasize the need to address the power dynamics in society.
More from Andrea Dworkin
All quotes →Romantic love, in pornography as in life, is the mythic celebration of female negation. For a woman, love is defined as her willingness to submit to her own annihilation.... The proof of love is that she is willing to be destroyed by the one whom she loves, for his sake. For the woman, love is always self-sacrifice, the sacrifice of identity, will, and bodily integrity, in order to fulfill and redeem the masculinity of her lover.
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I have been asked, politely and not so politely, why I am myself. This is an accounting any woman will be called on to give if she asserts her will.
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We are born into a world in which sexual possibilities are narrowly circumscribed. . . . We are programmed by the culture as surely as rats are programmed to make the arduous way through the scientist's maze, and that programming operates on every level of choice and action.
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Institutionalised in sports, the military, acculturated sexuality, the history and mythology of heroism, violence is taught to boys until they becomes its advocates.
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In her heart she is a mourner for those who have not survived. In her soul she is a warrior for those who are now as she was then. In her life she is both celebrant and proof of women's capacity and will to survive, to become, to act, to change self and society. And each year she is stronger and there are more of her.
Andrea DworkinRead
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